On the way home...

The water was too cold for fishes. The trees were too still for birds. Somewhere, a deer had fallen where it would never rise from. Merry held my hand through the wood, and the snow was not so cold- the air, less crisp.

Under a dead tree, he rubbed my hands warm enough to feel again. And camp was a thick of roots, where I held onto him to placate my rumbling belly. In the morning-night, it snowed, and we ate and drank and returned to the roots, full and starving.

I heard a voice call my name. Merry slept.